77. Sage #2
“Oh, pushy. I like it.” He starts the car and glances over, sunglasses slipping down the bridge of his nose just enough for me to see his eyes. “You’re so eager to run basic errands, it’s almost like you don’t want to be at your apartment.”
“Would you want to be there after someone put a noose up for you?”
“Maybe not. But then I love all forms of rope play, but especially the ones that look like the Kool-Aid Man is about to burst out of the wall and fuck everyone’s shit up.”
I snort. “That’s a weird visual, Milo.”
He shrugs and starts the engine.
The apartment looks the same as it always does—small, cluttered, unassuming. I try not to look at the light fixture in the living room and fail miserably.
Milo does his sweep before he lets me fully enter—windows, locks, closets, under the bed. He’s checking the bathroom when I hear it.
Crying. It’s quiet and muffled, coming from Amy’s bedroom.
I look at Milo. He’s heard it too. He raises an eyebrow and I shake my head. Whatever this is, Amy won’t want an audience.
I knock on her door. “Amy? It’s me.”
A pause. A sniffle. “Come in.”
She’s on her bed, cross-legged, still in her pajamas. Her eyes are puffy, her hair’s in a messy knot, and there’s a box of tissues beside her that’s seen heavy action.
By the look of her, she hasn’t left this room all day.
“Hey,” I say, sitting on the edge of the bed. “What’s going on?”
“Tyler and I broke up.”
The words come out wobbly, like she’s been saying them to herself all day trying to make them stick.
“What happened?”
“Everything. Nothing. I don’t know. It’s the same fight we’ve been having for weeks, except this time I couldn’t—” She grabs a tissue, twisting it in her hands. “I needed space. I told him I needed space, and he acted like I was the one being unreasonable.”
“Space from what specifically?”
“From him. From the Brock thing. His needs. All of it.” She blows her nose.
“The Brock thing? I thought Brock called his parents and everything was okay.”
Amy gives me a look like I’ve missed something obvious.
“Okay?” she repeats, dragging the tissue under her nose. “Sage, Brock’s parents calmed down after he left them a voicemail. But Tyler was still losing his mind. He kept saying it didn’t sound right. That Brock wouldn’t just ghost him.”
Wouldn’t just ghost him.
A tiny cold wire pulls tight in my chest.
“Tyler and Brock were that close?” I ask carefully.
She shrugs, but it’s jerky. Defensive. “They’ve known each other forever. Since high school. Tyler acts like Brock’s some sort of God. They were weirdly codependent about it. Like, constantly in each other’s business. Tyler used to drop everything when Brock called.”
I keep my face neutral. “And lately?”
Amy laughs, bitter and wet. “Lately . . .” She shakes her head. “He won’t let it go, Sage. He won’t accept that Brock left. He keeps saying something happened, keeps pushing me to question you, keeps saying you know more than you’re telling—”
“I’ve told him everything I know,” I say, and the lie is so practiced now it barely registers.
“I know. I’ve told him that. A hundred times.
But he’s—” She stops and takes a breath.
“I overheard him on the phone the other night with his friends. And it sounded like . . .” She blows out another breath, shakier this time.
“It sounded like they were planning something. Like they were going to come here and corner you. Intimidate you into talking. Tyler said something about ‘making her understand the consequences of lying,’ and I just—”
She breaks off. The tissue is shredded in her hands.
A chill runs down my spine.
“That’s when I told him I wanted space,” she says. “I can’t be with someone who’s talking about threatening my friend.” Her eyes find mine, red and raw. “I’m sorry, Sage. I don’t know why he’s like this.”
“Don’t apologize. This isn’t your fault.”
“It feels like my fault. I brought you to that party, and Brock was there and we kind of pushed you onto him, and now Brock’s gone and Tyler’s unhinged and you’re—” She gestures at me. “Did you move out?”
“Not really. I’m just . . . I’ve been staying at Holden’s with the guys.”
Amy goes still, the Tyler misery sliding off her face.
“Wait. Staying staying? You moved in? With all of them?”
“Not officially. I just realized we’ve been taking over the apartment lately. And Holden has a house . . .” I let the sentence trail and shrug. “I don’t hate it.”
“Oh my God.” Both hands press to her cheeks, delight cutting through the puffiness. “It’s serious. You’re domestic with five—” She glances at the door, drops her voice. “—five very large, emotionally complicated men. Sage.”
“It’s definitely complicated,” I say, the understatement of my life.
“I have so many logistical questions. And they’ve been running through my head since the pan-cock breakfast so I’m desperate for answers.”
“Okay. Shoot.”
She sits up straighter, suddenly brighter. “After you’ve been with all five of them—can you even walk?”
I laugh, and it’s real, and I love her a little for pulling it out of me. “Some days, no. We’ll leave it there.”
But she’s watching my face now, her own smile fading, because Amy’s known me long enough to hear the thing I’m not saying.
“Okay—something’s wrong.” She peers into my face. “What is it?”
There it is. The question I’ve been outrunning all day.
“It’s Eli.” His name comes out like a splinter. “We’re in a bad place. The worst place. He said some things, and then he just . . . walked away. I haven’t heard from him since.”
She reaches for my hand. “Oh, Sage. Eli? He seemed like a steady one.”
“Yeah. I thought that too.” I breathe through the ache. “I don’t want to get into it. I really don’t. Can we just—not, for a minute?”
“Of course.” She squeezes my fingers. “But for the record? When a man’s that locked down and he runs, it’s almost never about the person he ran from. Tyler taught me that one the hard way. I’m not the problem. Neither are you.”
The parallel settles between us—two women on a bed full of shredded tissues, nursing two different man-shaped wounds.
“And your secret’s been safe since the day I found out,” she adds, softer.
“It’ll stay safe. The school, Tyler, anyone.
I haven’t even told my mother, and I tell my mother everything.
” A flicker of the old mischief. “Although it has physically pained me not to tell Tyler the real reason you never wanted basic Brock is that you upgraded to a five-pack.”
I huff a laugh.
“For what it’s worth,” she says, sobering, “the way they dote on you—maybe that’s exactly what you need right now. Even with one of them off being a colossal idiot.”
“Maybe.” I look down at the tissue she’s reduced to confetti. “They’re weirdos. But they’re my weirdos. And they’re the safest people I’ve ever met”—the word snags, because four days ago I’d have said it without carving Eli out of the sentence—“most of them, anyway.”
She takes a deep, shuddery breath. “I’m still scared for you. Tyler and his friends—”
“I know. But you don’t have to be.” I reach over and squeeze her hand. “I’ll be okay. My guys will make sure I’m okay.”
She leans forward, expression thoughtful. “I have more questions.”
“Of course you do. Go ahead.”
“Okay. Rapid fire—how does it even work? Do they also sleep with each other? Do they take turns? Is there a schedule? Do you have a favorite? You have a favorite, don’t you. It’s the giant one, isn’t it—?”
“Amy—”
“Is it the pretty one? The one with the dark curls? Because if it is, I respect that choice, but I have to say, you’re wrong and the answer is the big guy. There’s just something about the idea of a girthy dick that really gets me—”
I tip over onto the bed, giggling as she continues to pelt questions at me.
I spend the next twenty minutes answering approximately one-third of them while deflecting the rest, and by the end of it she’s laughing and I’m laughing and the tissues are forgotten and the Tyler crisis has been temporarily displaced by the far more entertaining crisis of my love life.
It’s the most normal I’ve felt in days, and I hold onto this precious feeling.
When she finally runs out of steam, I tell her to go take a shower and freshen up. She looks like she needs it, and she doesn’t argue.
“I’m gonna make you some tea and then I’m going to order food,” I say, steering her toward the bathroom. “Any preferences?”
“Thai? I could devour a giant bowl of Drunken Noodles.”
“Thai it is.”
“Thanks, Sage,” she says, giving me a small smile. “It’s been good talking to you again. I’ve missed this.”
“Me too.” I give her a quick hug before I slide off the bed and head back into the living room. A minute later, I hear the shower start.
I go to the kitchen.
Milo is standing at the counter, phone already in his hand, all the humor gone from his face.
“I heard enough,” he says.